This invention relates in general to a tire lubricating assembly and relates in particular to a tire lubricating assembly designed for the lubrication of the bead area of a pneumatic tire.
In many operations involving the manufacture of pneumatic tires, following fabrication and vulcanization, the tire is placed on a chuck assembly so that various inspection and grinding operations can be performed. Generally, for example, in a tire uniformity machine, tires are advanced along a driven conveyor, generally of the roller type, into the uniformity inspection machine whereupon a first chuck is raised to engage the bead area of the tire following which the tire is elevated so that the opposed bead is engaged by an opposed chuck member. The tire is then inflated and various inspections are conducted. The tire is then deflated, the lower chuck is retracted and the tire is removed from the chuck and moved on out of the machine so that another tire can be moved in.
In such a system and in other areas wherein tires are intended to be mounted on chucks for further manufacturing or inspection operations, it is desirable to lubricate the bead area along its seating surface so as to accomplish a complete air tight seal with the mating surfaces of the chuck or for that matter the wheel of an automobile.
In the prior art, as can be seen in a catalog distributed by Hasbach Maschinen-und Anlagenbau GmbH, such a general arrangement is illustrated. That includes the driven, roller type conveyor which is disposed adjacent the machine which will perform an inspection and/or grinding operation on the tire and along which the tires advance. It will be seen in the prior art that generally a reciprocating, cylindrical lubricating sleeve in employed and is advanced upwardly from a lubrication chamber beneath the conveyor, through an opening in the conveyor, so as to be disposed inside the tire bead following which the tire is rotated about the sleeve by activation of the conveyor to receive the lubrication from the lubricating sleeve.
In the prior art, the lubricating sleeve is generally simply of cylindrical configuration. The difficulty encountered in the prior art is that the bead of the tire is not flat or straight. Tire beads taper from the inside to the outside of the tire at an angle to facilitate eventual air tight seating against the rim of a vehicle wheel. Therefore, use of a straight walled applicator sleeve results in contact of the tip of the tire bead only and does not fully lubricate the bead surface. This leads to difficulties in achieving a complete bead coating and, thus, a complete seal between the tire bead and the seating surface of the chuck referred to above. This is believed to be undesirable because the tire is inflated during the inspection and/or grinding operation and the desired degree of inflation may be difficult to maintain.
It is therefore believed desirable to produce a tire lubricating assembly which will in fact fully lubricate all appropriate surface areas of the bead of the tire.
It had been found that the object aforementioned can be achieved by providing an hourglass shaped applicator having a dual taper such that it tapers from its widest diameter at its opposed ends toward a narrower diameter in the center. It has been found that the utilization of such an applicator in a tire bead applicator assembly will enable the sleeve to fully contact all the appropriate tapered surface areas of the bead thus ensuring that the lubrication medium is fully applied thereto.
It has also been found that the lubrication chamber into which the sleeve is inserted and retracted for engagement with the tire can be provided with a unique lubrication chamber cap which has a central aperture so that the sleeve may reciprocate through it and which has a top surface which tapers from the periphery toward the central aperture to serve as a funnel to return excess lubrication medium back into the lubrication chamber thus avoiding waste and possible unsafe conditions below and adjacent to the conveyor.
Accordingly, production of an improved tire bead lubricating assembly of the character above-described becomes the principal object of this invention with other objects thereof becoming more apparent upon a reading of the following brief specification considered and interpreted in view of the accompanying drawings.